Thats right ladies and gents, after the roaring success of the Bucket Mod, I have invented my own gardening utensils based Clio modification. I bring you front brake cooling with the use of this beast...
A cheap watering can from your local gardening store!
Actually, if I'm honest, the watering can idea fell flat on its face (details later), but it seemed like a good way to get peoples attention
. So, now that your here, how about a guide to adding fog light front brake cooling ducts without removing the acoustic valve, horns, or carbon canister?
First off, an appology. While I remembered to take a number of photos while doing this, I completely forgot to take a note of the tools that I was using. I will try and mention whats needed as we go along.
Ok, lets get going. First up, jack the car up, put the front on axle stands, and remove the front wheels.
Next up remove the wheel arch liners. I didn't take any pictures of this, but there are a lot of guides about. Basically each one is held on with 2 plastic bungs inside the wheel arch, and then 3 torx screw holding the liner to the bumper. One on the inside of the arch, 2 under the bottom of the bumper. They might be hidden under a splitter if you have one fitted.
The fog lights will now be accessible. Just undo the 2 torx screws holding them in and they will come right out. Undo the plastic clip with the wires in and your done.
Remove the fog light surrounds next. they are just clipped in with 4 plastic lugs which can be easily pushed with your fingers from inside the bumper and they just pop out (sorry again for no pics).
So now you have the arch liners off and the lights out its about making space for the ducting. I will be using 100mm ducting, which is a tight fit, but is possible.
First up, passenger side.
In the way here are the horns. You could remove one, or dismantle the mount and made a new one. But I just rolled my sleves up and bent the mount pushing the horns out the way. You might want to undo the wires to them first to avoid pulling them to far and damaging them. But in the end you can get them out the way.
The view from the front shows that there is 'just' enough room for some ducting.
Next up, drivers side. I knew the carbon canister was in the way here, but never knew how much in the way. Initial thoughts were game over here, its gotta come out.
But after some poking around I found a way. The canister is held in by being screwed to a metal mount (which you can see above) and then on the other side there is a singe bolt on a plastic 'arm' holding it firm. If you undo just this bolt you can then easily bend the mount to angle the carbon canister out of the way.
The view from the front shows that like the passenger side, there is now room, just.
Now onto making the ducts themselves. I'm using 100mm single ply ducting. Be warned, this stuff isn't as cheap as you might expect. 1m is going to cost well over a tenner. You need about 30cm each side, but I bought a meter and cut it in half so 50cm on each side which I trimmed down once on the car.
The holes in the fog light surrounds are not perfectly round, they are elongated meaning the 100mm ducting doesn't fit straight on. You have to snip the wire on the end ring in a few places to splay it out and allow it to fit over the hole.
Then its just a case of using duct tape (aptly named) to secure the ducting to the surrounds. Be liberal with the tape so its secure, but try not to make it to thick or uneven around the areas at the top and bottom of the surround, as it can get a bit tight fitting them back in later.
After a while you should have 2 lovely ducts ready to go.
Next up you need to cut some holes in the arch liners. Again sorry for no pics of this bit, but you can see later on where they were cut. You need to cut a 100mm diameter hole in the bottom inside part of the liner.
Now back out to the car and getting them fitted. Feed the feed through the bumper until its all the way in and you can clip the surround back into its slots on the bumper. It is a tight fit through the hole in the bumper, but if you jiggle it a bit and take your time it goes in. Push the 4 lugs on the fog surround back into their slots and you should get this:
Push the ducting together and pin it in somewhere so you can get the arch liner back on without feeling like your wrestling an epileptic elephant. On the passenger side you can hook it on a horn, and on the drivers side theres a little pipe thing that does the job. Refit the arch liners and then reach through the hole and pull the ducting through until its straighten up and no longer compressed inside the bumper (sorry no pics). Once you are sure its right, trim of the excess ducting with a knife and some snips. You might have to stagger it a bit as the pipe doesn't come out completely square with the liner. If you want you can also secure it with a bit of good old duct tape. Try not to have more than a couple of cm of ducting exposes as there isn't much room between the liner and the tyre on full lock.
This is now the view from the front
Then repeat on the other side.
And there you have it. A couple of fog light brake cooling ducts without having to remove anything from behind the bumper. Put your wheels back on, drop it back down, check the clearance by putting it on full lock both ways and checking that the ducting doesn't foul the tyre, and off you go. If you want some better airflow you can add some deflector plates too.
So there you go, GhettoMod Brake Cooling Ducts... Because Race Car!
But wait, "what about the watering can?" I hear you say. Well, My plan was to make some deflector plate using it, (which I did) but they have turned out to be faaaaar to flimsy to offer any meaningful deflection. But I had some fun making them.
After a few minutes I had reduced the watering can to this:
And a couple of these:
I then mounted them in the usual way by using the bolt that is already there holding some sort of suspension bits up (I had no idea what this bolt does, so supported the subframe under it with a jack before undoing it, just in case), a few self tappers and a cable tie.
But like I said, what felt like quite sturdy plastic when in the form of a watering can turned out to be really flimsy, so they are going to be next to useless. Having been to Tesco tonight I have spotted that a petrol jerry can might be a better bet. There only a fiver so I might hack one of those apart and see how that goes. Going to need some heavier duty scissors for that though.
So a failed watering can mod, but I think the ducts have turned out quite well. I will have to wait until Rockingham in June to see how they perform on track.
Let the mickey taking commence
A cheap watering can from your local gardening store!
Actually, if I'm honest, the watering can idea fell flat on its face (details later), but it seemed like a good way to get peoples attention
. So, now that your here, how about a guide to adding fog light front brake cooling ducts without removing the acoustic valve, horns, or carbon canister? First off, an appology. While I remembered to take a number of photos while doing this, I completely forgot to take a note of the tools that I was using. I will try and mention whats needed as we go along.
Ok, lets get going. First up, jack the car up, put the front on axle stands, and remove the front wheels.
Next up remove the wheel arch liners. I didn't take any pictures of this, but there are a lot of guides about. Basically each one is held on with 2 plastic bungs inside the wheel arch, and then 3 torx screw holding the liner to the bumper. One on the inside of the arch, 2 under the bottom of the bumper. They might be hidden under a splitter if you have one fitted.
The fog lights will now be accessible. Just undo the 2 torx screws holding them in and they will come right out. Undo the plastic clip with the wires in and your done.
Remove the fog light surrounds next. they are just clipped in with 4 plastic lugs which can be easily pushed with your fingers from inside the bumper and they just pop out (sorry again for no pics).
So now you have the arch liners off and the lights out its about making space for the ducting. I will be using 100mm ducting, which is a tight fit, but is possible.
First up, passenger side.
In the way here are the horns. You could remove one, or dismantle the mount and made a new one. But I just rolled my sleves up and bent the mount pushing the horns out the way. You might want to undo the wires to them first to avoid pulling them to far and damaging them. But in the end you can get them out the way.
The view from the front shows that there is 'just' enough room for some ducting.
Next up, drivers side. I knew the carbon canister was in the way here, but never knew how much in the way. Initial thoughts were game over here, its gotta come out.
But after some poking around I found a way. The canister is held in by being screwed to a metal mount (which you can see above) and then on the other side there is a singe bolt on a plastic 'arm' holding it firm. If you undo just this bolt you can then easily bend the mount to angle the carbon canister out of the way.
The view from the front shows that like the passenger side, there is now room, just.
Now onto making the ducts themselves. I'm using 100mm single ply ducting. Be warned, this stuff isn't as cheap as you might expect. 1m is going to cost well over a tenner. You need about 30cm each side, but I bought a meter and cut it in half so 50cm on each side which I trimmed down once on the car.
The holes in the fog light surrounds are not perfectly round, they are elongated meaning the 100mm ducting doesn't fit straight on. You have to snip the wire on the end ring in a few places to splay it out and allow it to fit over the hole.
Then its just a case of using duct tape (aptly named) to secure the ducting to the surrounds. Be liberal with the tape so its secure, but try not to make it to thick or uneven around the areas at the top and bottom of the surround, as it can get a bit tight fitting them back in later.
After a while you should have 2 lovely ducts ready to go.
Next up you need to cut some holes in the arch liners. Again sorry for no pics of this bit, but you can see later on where they were cut. You need to cut a 100mm diameter hole in the bottom inside part of the liner.
Now back out to the car and getting them fitted. Feed the feed through the bumper until its all the way in and you can clip the surround back into its slots on the bumper. It is a tight fit through the hole in the bumper, but if you jiggle it a bit and take your time it goes in. Push the 4 lugs on the fog surround back into their slots and you should get this:
Push the ducting together and pin it in somewhere so you can get the arch liner back on without feeling like your wrestling an epileptic elephant. On the passenger side you can hook it on a horn, and on the drivers side theres a little pipe thing that does the job. Refit the arch liners and then reach through the hole and pull the ducting through until its straighten up and no longer compressed inside the bumper (sorry no pics). Once you are sure its right, trim of the excess ducting with a knife and some snips. You might have to stagger it a bit as the pipe doesn't come out completely square with the liner. If you want you can also secure it with a bit of good old duct tape. Try not to have more than a couple of cm of ducting exposes as there isn't much room between the liner and the tyre on full lock.
This is now the view from the front
Then repeat on the other side.
And there you have it. A couple of fog light brake cooling ducts without having to remove anything from behind the bumper. Put your wheels back on, drop it back down, check the clearance by putting it on full lock both ways and checking that the ducting doesn't foul the tyre, and off you go. If you want some better airflow you can add some deflector plates too.
So there you go, GhettoMod Brake Cooling Ducts... Because Race Car!
But wait, "what about the watering can?" I hear you say. Well, My plan was to make some deflector plate using it, (which I did) but they have turned out to be faaaaar to flimsy to offer any meaningful deflection. But I had some fun making them
.After a few minutes I had reduced the watering can to this:
And a couple of these:
I then mounted them in the usual way by using the bolt that is already there holding some sort of suspension bits up (I had no idea what this bolt does, so supported the subframe under it with a jack before undoing it, just in case), a few self tappers and a cable tie.
But like I said, what felt like quite sturdy plastic when in the form of a watering can turned out to be really flimsy, so they are going to be next to useless. Having been to Tesco tonight I have spotted that a petrol jerry can might be a better bet. There only a fiver so I might hack one of those apart and see how that goes. Going to need some heavier duty scissors for that though.
So a failed watering can mod, but I think the ducts have turned out quite well. I will have to wait until Rockingham in June to see how they perform on track.
Let the mickey taking commence
